Picnic with your wine!

This is the value wine site!

Posts Tagged ‘finding inexpensive wine’

There are times I walk into a store and need a bottle for something – a party, a work function, or maybe just for myself. When traveling it can particularly difficult to find a good wine, many times I don’t speak the language enough to even read the label!

Most markets and stores have 100’s (say 300) wines. Often the clerks’ only skills are limited to using a box cutter and a bar code reader.

QUESTION: How can you be reasonably sure that a wine is decent?

ANSWER:

You can pick a good wine in under 3 minutes . . . even if everything is in a language you don’t speak!

Look for 3 things:

1.) Price! Why beat around the bush, this is IMPORTANT! Scan the selves, look for the cheapest wine and add a couple of bucks to set the range. If you want to go higher end so you don’t look cheap, double the number!

CONGRATULATIONS, you eliminated 90% of store’s selection! That leaves~ 30 wines of 300 to choose from.

2.) Next – heavy or light? – Heavy alcohol is 12%+ and light is 11% or less. If it’s cold or a young crowd go heavy, if it’s warm or older crowd go light. We’re now down to say 20 bottles (some will fall in the middle).

3.) “It Factor” – Now we’re down to the last choice. Look at the BACK of bottle. Is there an essay on the wine (maybe a picture of wine maker?) GREAT! The people making are proud of their product! Usually any of these is good.

Put them all in the cart, eyeball them and pick the one that strikes your fancy!

Open & Enjoy!

========>>> SHORTCUT! Look at people’s shopping carts, if you see several people with the same wine – that’s likely a good wine!

How do we pick our wine?

We limit our reviews to 2 categories:
- Wine under $5/bottle
- Unusual liquor
--------------------------------
We select our wine from large retailers of wine:
- Trader Joe's
- BevMo
- Safeway
- CVS and Rite Aid
================
We select 2nd and 3rd tier national brands. We skip big varietals major brands since they have already are well covered. We do make an exception for small runs from a larger winery (such as Sutter Home White Zinfandel)

We try to make sure they are in regular production and not 'excess' from a major vintner which can be a very limited run.
This means we tend towards varieties that are different.

The other item we cover are distilled liquor not covered on other sites. Recently we covered Chinese overproof (100+) white lightning, a raw distilled spirit of questionable provenance. This is not covered. Earlier we covered Newfie Screech, a Canadian distilled spirit made by putting distilled fermented beet juice into abandoned Port and Sherry kegs and leaving on the beach of Newfoundland for several months.

Picking a wine – anywhere, anytime!

Need a bottle for something? Many times I don't speak the language & can't read the label!

Most markets and stores have 300 wines. The clerks' can use a box cutter and a bar code reader.

QUESTION: How can get a decent wine?

ANSWER: - Look for 3 things:

1.) Price! This is IMPORTANT! Scan the selves, look for the cheapest wine and add a couple of bucks. If you want higher end double the number!

2.) Next - heavy or light? - Heavy alcohol is 12%+ and light is 11% or less. If it's cold or a young crowd go heavy, if it's warm or older crowd go light. We're now down to say 20 bottles (some will fall in the middle).

3.) "It Factor" - Look at the BACK of bottle. Is there an essay on the wine, picture of wine maker?) GREAT! The people making are proud of their product! Usually any of these is good.

Eyeball them and pick the one that strikes your fancy!!

========>>> SHORTCUT! Look at people's shopping carts, if you see several people with the same wine - that's likely a good wine!